Finalists for the honor of LCPS Teacher of the Year for 2018-2019 are, from left, Hope Woolard of South Lenoir High School, Ashley Martin of Banks Elementary School and Katena Cherry of Southeast Elementary School. The winner will be announced March 1.

Experience, enthusiasm for classroom traits shared by the three Teacher of Year finalists

Three teachers who together have 49 years experience in the classroom are finalists for the honor of LCPS Teacher of the Year for 2018-2019.

Katena Cherry of Southeast Elementary School, Ashley Martin of Banks Elementary School and Hope Woolard of South Lenoir High School were chosen from a group of 18 educators representing their schools as Teacher of the Year.

The selection was based on the teachers’ resume, two written elements – a professional biography and a description of their philosophy of teaching – and an interview before a panel of judges. The judges – three district-level administrators, a principal and faculty member – met with all 18 candidates Tuesday. Finalists were announced Tuesday afternoon.

The same judges will observe Cherry, Martin and Woolard in the classroom before choosing the district’s Teacher of the Year. The winner will be announced at LCPS’s employee recognition banquet on March 1.

LCPS’s Teacher of the Year will represent the district in regional competition next December.

Cherry is a two-time teacher of the year selection on the school level, in 2007 at Carver Heights Elementary School in Goldsboro and this year at Southeast Elementary, where she’s in her second year as a fourth-grade teacher.

A teacher for 17 years in North Carolina, Florida and Virginia, Cherry earned her bachelor’s degree in elementary education at East Carolina University, took graduate courses at UNC-Pembroke and completed her master’s degree in curriculum and instruction through Grand Canyon University.

“Teaching is a lifetime calling,” she wrote in her biography.

A believer in data-driven instruction –using student assessments to help shape an individualized approach to learning – she feels as strongly about relating to students on a personal level.

“As I teach the content and allow my students to explore more through hands-on activities and discussion, I not only learn how they think, but I also learn a little more about them personally,” she wrote about her teaching style. “Understanding my students’ background makes it possible for me to explore new methods for teaching concepts.”

Martin, a fifth-grade teacher at Banks since 2012, joined LCPS in 2005 as a teacher a Moss Hill Elementary and previously taught at Northeast Elementary School in Goldsboro. She has 12 years teaching experience.

She holds an associate degree from Lenoir Community College and a bachelor’s degree and master’s degree in elementary education from East Carolina University. She has also completed an aeronautics course at LCC on private pilot flight theory.

In her science class, she employs a NASA-based curriculum that has garnered attention from her peers in the district and nationally. In 2017 she was named a Teacher Leader by the NASA Langley Research Center Office of Education and has created presentations for the NASA STEM Educator Professional Development Collaborative at Texas State University.

She was influenced to become a teacher by her parents, she wrote in her biography, simply because “I wanted to share the love I had received from my own parents with those children who were not as fortunate as myself.”

Woolard came to South Lenoir High as a ninth-grade math teacher in 2016 after teaching at six other schools in Lenoir and Wayne counties, including Greenwood Middle School, where she was named Teacher of the Year and Secondary Math Education Teacher of the Year. She has taught for 20 years.

She earned a bachelor’s degree in education from East Carolina University and a master’s degree in education from Gardner-Webb University.

At South Lenoir, she is a member of a team of Math I teachers that has helped students make huge strides in a course that is the gateway to other high school math courses and can be a barrier to graduation for those who don’t succeed. Last school year, nearly five times as many South Lenoir students achieved proficiency in Math I compared to the previous year, and the number of failures dropped from 48 to 15.

“Good teachers must be realistic in their mindset of their students’ capabilities, but the bar must be set high,” Woolard wrote about her philosophy of teaching. “In my experience, students will rise to the expectations that you have for them. If you expect little, your students will produce little. If you expect much, your students will produce much.”